INEC chairperson, Mahmood Yakubu, begins leave, hands over

A month to the expiration of his tenure as INEC Chairperson, Mahmood Yakubu, a professor, has begun his pre-exit leave.

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Mr Yakubu, on Tuesday, also handed over the affairs of the commission to May Agbamuche-Mbu, the most senior national commissioner.

Mrs Agbamuche-Mbu is now the acting chairperson of the commission pending the appointment of a substantive head of the electoral body.

Mr Yakubu handed over her today at the ongoing meeting of the commission with other National Commissioners and the Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) present.

President Bola Tinubu is expected to nominate a new chairperson and send to the National Assembly for confirmation and subsequent swearing-in.

Mr Yakubu’s tenure is expected to elapse on 9 November, having been first appointed on the same date in 2015 and reappointed by the late former President Muhammadu Buhari in 2020.

About Acting INEC Chairperson

May Agbamuche-Mbu is a seasoned legal practitioner with over three decades of experience working with diverse clients in both the public and private sectors.

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She hails from Delta State, although she was born in Kano, where she attended St. Louis Secondary School.

She graduated from the University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University) in 1984 with an LLB in Law.

After her call to the Bar in 1985, she attended the College of Law, London and qualified as a Solicitor of the Supreme Court of England and Wales.

Mrs Agbamuche-Mbu has an LLM with specialisation in Commercial and Corporate Law from Queen Mary and Westfield College, London and completed two postgraduate degree programmes in International Dispute Resolution and International Business Law, respectively.

May is also an expert in Alternative Dispute Resolution and is a member of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators of the United Kingdom Nigeria branch, where she served as Secretary to the Institute.

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Between March 2010 and November 2011, she served on the Presidential Projects Assessment Committee (PPAC) as the sole solicitor, evaluating an extensive nationwide portfolio of major unfinished public projects in Nigeria and in March 2016, she was appointed a member of the Ministerial Committee set up to prepare The Road Map for the Solid Minerals Sector.

Before her appointment as a National Commissioner for INEC, she was the managing partner of her law firm in Lagos, Norfolk Partners and also the editor of THISDAY LAWYER, a weekly legal pullout in one of the nation’s most widely read newspapers.